I’ve updated my LinkdIn profile with a slightly abridged version of the text below (because they have a character limit on what you can put in your summary):
“Let’s cut the bullsh*t. I’m not ‘flexible’ when it comes to the work I enjoy or the career I want to have. I’m not highly adaptable and I don’t enjoy new challenges above all else. This is code for me accepting poor job security, and never actually learning anything except buzzwords about the work that I supposedly do.
I am not passionate about the work that your company does. I save my passion for non-profit related activities
Just because I am not motivated only by money does not mean you can reduce the salary you offer me on the pretence that you are Corporately Socially Responsible.
I am not able to be a ‘team player’ yet at the same time compete against my fellow colleagues for job promotions and bonus money. This requires a bit more of a split personality than I’m prepared to develop.
I don’t work well in an open plan office because I actually like to be able to think clearly and not be constantly interrupted when I’m working.
I think best in my pyjamas, not a carefully selected to comply with a ‘business casual’ dress-code outfit.
When I am working from home I am doing exactly the same amount of work I would be doing in the office minus the time spent in useless meetings, making small talk with colleagues, indulging in office politics, going to seminars on subjects such as ‘How to create brand me’ , but plus time spent calling the IT helpdesk. So about an hour and a half a day. On a good day.
I don’t want to do lots of business travel. Either the trip is for business purposes and therefore can be done by videolink/skype/any number of virtual platforms, or it is of the wine and dine schoomzy, bullshit variety, and as you may have realised, that is not my forte.
I don’t want to work solely to a checklist (in the environmental sector that means BREEAM, LEED , Code for Sustainable Homes… etc etc all constantly being changed and updated) in the name of efficiency . If you want a job doing that has had the creativity sucked out of it, design a bloody robot to do it.
Oh and psychometric testing before I start? How about next time I skip the 4 years I spent at university getting a first class degree in Mechanical Engineering and a Masters in Structural Engineering and just spend an hour or so practising for those tests instead? It’s not like I expect to use anything I learnt I university anyway. Shall I pass on the good news to my daughter? I reckon she could ace those things by the time she’s 14.
I’m not interested in breaking the ‘glass ceiling’ for women. Call it lack of ambition but why should I be ambitious when every large firm seems to exploit their labour force, the environment or tax loopholes? (Or a heady combination of all three?). We women are multi-tasking perfectionists who can lean-in and talk just as much bullsh*t and be as destructive and exploitative as tall, straight, white men with good hair who went to expensive schools, but I don’t feel the need to prove the point.
I don’t want childcare benefits, I want to be able to afford to take the time to look after my own child.
I don’t want a company car. I want a GIANT, electric, driverless company car. You could call it a ‘tram’ and everyone else could benefit from it too.
If you still have any work for me, I have about an hour and a half a day while my daughter naps to think about things for you. Which I may or may not do, depending on whether it’s an interesting problem or not.
Thanks,
Lara”
No more b*llshit rat race jobs!
laratheescapeartist 
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